


How We Fall, and How We Get Back Up Again

by lumenera



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Akaashi Keiji & Kozume Kenma Friendship, Akaashi overworks himself too much, Anxious Kozume Kenma, Creative souls, Gen, Kenma also gets panic attacks, Kenma has anxiety, Roommates, We love Kenma, gamedesigner!Kenma, it's not a fic if you don't self project, mentions of Bokuto and Kuroo - Freeform, scifiwriter!Akaashi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:42:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23465590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lumenera/pseuds/lumenera
Summary: Kenma didn't consider himself good with others, which was probably why it was a stroke of luck when he ended up rooming with Akaashi Keiji, of all people. He was probably the best roommate Kenma could have ever asked for. He never pried too deeply into his personal life, was neat and organized, and best of all, rarely brought friends over to their dorm room.
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji & Kozume Kenma
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	How We Fall, and How We Get Back Up Again

Kenma didn't consider himself good with people, which was probably why it was a stroke of luck when he ended up rooming with Akaashi Keiji, of all people. He and Akaashi were decent friends, someone Kenma was closer to than most considering Kuroo’s and Bokuto’s self proclaimed “broship”. Usually, their interactions consisted of rolling their eyes at whatever antics the duo got themselves up to, so Kenma’s best impression of the other setter was quiet and intelligent. He was right on both accounts.

Akaashi was probably the best roommate Kenma could have ever asked for. He never pried too deeply into his personal life, was neat and organized, and best of all, rarely brought friends over to their dorm room. Akaashi was a wizard in English/literature and social studies, while Kenma preferred math and programming, so when their schedules aligned, they studied together. Kenma felt his scores always improved when that happened.

If he had time, Akaashi edited the little blurbs Kenma made for his games, and Kenma critiqued some of the chapters Akaashi wrote, noting the amount of action, tension, and dialogue, the little things that made scenes come together. What Akaashi did, writing, felt a lot like what Kenma liked doing, creating games. Each one had a story inside, characters with desires to win and an enemy in front of them. Sometimes he sketched up his roommate’s characters and different concept ideas on sticky notes and put them on Akaashi’s computer, where the drawings always disappeared into Akaashi’s 3 subject notebook dedicated solely to his novel, filled with all sorts of notes and ideas collected over the years. He bought Kenma a slice of apple pie for his birthday, and Kenma returned the favor when Akaashi’s birthday rolled around with a slice of cheesecake.

Akaashi was the one who suggested he start a Youtube channel. There was something different about Youtube, because all of the social interaction was limited to a screen, and the fact that people were strangely positive whenever he posted. He kept the talking he did to a minimum, preferring to have light, soothing music in the background while he played. It’d never really occurred to him that he could make money off of people watching him game, but it was nice to have a steadier income to save besides his indie games he made, complimenting Akaashi’s tutoring, TA hours, and his job at the university’s bookstore. He wasn't sure how Akaashi managed to balance all of that on top of having a 4.0, majoring in Literature with a minor in Psychology, and writing his first novel, but he wasn’t going to question it. As long as Akaashi didn’t overwork himself, Kenma let him be, just like he let Kenma be. On late nights, Kenma made Akaashi matcha green tea for him to drink while he worked, and Kenma did the dishes.

So when the second year of uni rolled around, it wasn’t a surprise when the two of them got an apartment together. And when anxiety got the best of him, and the panic attacks got worse, he switched to fully online classes. Akaashi just nodded and said, “Don’t stay up too late, you still have to show up to class on time.”

The outside world felt a lot more overbearing then Kenma could handle, and it was easier to hide away in the safety of their shared apartment. The only times he really left the building was for his Walks At Weird Hours, as he called them. Usually midnight, sometimes 3 or 4 in the morning when he would go outside to get some fresh air and exercise, when no one else was outside. He wouldn’t have done it if Akaashi hadn’t gently reminded him that he had to get some sort of exercise somehow, which is what he used to use volleyball for. Other than that, he didn’t leave the apartment unless it was his turn to do laundry, taking the clothes to the basement level where the room of washing and drying machines was located.

He worked on his games in the kitchen, and classwork on the couch when the bedroom felt too confining. He felt trapped by the four walls and the minimal space it provided. They shared the bedroom, because it was much cheaper to have a one bedroom apartment than a two bedroom. The setup was almost the exact same as it was in their dorm, two beds pushed to the corners of the bedroom with desks side by side, touching the edges of the beds. Kenma’s desk had his computer and class notebooks hastily sprawled all over, while Akaashi’s had his desk, with a bulletin board on top and a filing cabinet on the bottom. There was nothing on the desk’s surface except his planner. Akaashi’s life was practically ruled by his planner. Kenma, on the other hand, was more lax about his schedule. Attend some online classes, do some coding, think about what videos to do next. Find new games that would be interesting. Homework, to keep his grades up.

He stopped using his phone, having beaten most of the games on it anyway and not wanting to talk to others. He kept up with his classes on his computer, and when he needed to contact someone, he sent them an email. Shouyou became a steady pen pal, accepting this change from texts to emails without complaint. Those emails from his cheerful friend became a highlight when they arrived, usually accompanied by a story about stupid Kageyama or something like that. 

He didn’t mind talking to less and less people everyday. Really, it made him feel better.

On Kenma’s really bad days, if anyone stopped by, Akaashi turned them away at the door, namely Kuroo and Bokuto. Part of him didn’t want to avoid Kuroo, because they’d been best friends as long as he could remember, but Kuroo didn’t get anxious. He didn’t quite understand what it’s like for Kenma, though he appreciated the effort. It was hard to articulate his thoughts, so much easier to run away instead. Kuroo could be demanding, though he never meant anything by it. That was just his nature, not his fault. The furtive glances and whispers drove Kenma mad most days, and became a big _What’s wrong with you?_ straight to his face. Kenma didn’t need someone else to tell him something was wrong with him, and pity him for it.

Akaashi felt different than the rest of the outside world. He made his words count, such an opposite to Bokuto’s dynamic personality. He read people like books, knowing exactly what to say, and put his psychology classes to good use and became a listening ear when it was Kenma up at 3 AM, without a filter, needing to talk something out. He never judged, taking everything in with little comment. Kenma didn’t like deluging much information though, so he held back some. Akaashi didn’t need to know everything.

Hinata was vibrant, but in a different way. Shouyou was more like a ray of sunshine, the gentle brightness, though full of energy. Bokuto was more like the ocean, depending on the time of day, either unrelenting or smooth, but almost dull and lifeless. Bokuto’s Emo Mode, Akaashi liked to call it. Kenma never knew when that happened, so he tried to steer clear of Bokuto regardless. It wasn’t personal, considering he was avoiding the majority of the world in physical presence. Like Akaashi, Shouyou never asked for more than what Kenma could give.

Sometimes he featured Akaashi on his channel, when the latter had time. His roommate had a real affinity for Animal Crossing, and it was fun to play a game that didn’t require a lot of effort. They played New Horizons together when it came out, sitting on the old couch Kenma’s parents had given them when they moved in.

“Kenma?”

Kenma glanced at Akaashi. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“You can call me Keiji if you like.”

•••

One particular day had Kenma shut up in his room for the entirety of it. His heart was beating far too fast and he curled up under the covers, trying to ignore the wave of nausea rolling over him, breathing heavily. His head felt dizzy, and he threw off the covers as the hot and cold flashes assaulted him, running over his back in short bursts. It was both burning hot and freezing cold at the same time and _where was the air_ ? He took as many deep breaths as he could, trying to regain a sense of normalcy. Once his hands weren’t covered by the blanket anymore, he could see them shaking ever so slightly. _Breathe, Kenma_ . He curled into a ball in the corner of his bed, waiting for everything to subside. _Please go away please go away please go away_ . It did not go away. _Breathe in, breathe out._

He tried the grounding technique the school’s therapist had emailed him about a couple days prior. 5 things you see. _Blanket, bed, Akaashi’s bed, Akaashi’s blanket(neatly folded at the end of his bed), and Akaashi’s pillow(On top of his folded blanket)._ 4 things you can touch. He reached out as he named them. _Bed frame, Pillow, Blanket, Watch._ 3 things you can hear. _People outside, the alarm clock ticking_. He couldn’t think of one more, so he tapped his fingers on the wooden part of his bed and counted that as his third. 2 things you can smell. He took a sniff. He could smell the air freshener Akaashi preferred to use. It smelled like lavender. Kenma didn’t mind it; it wasn’t an overwhelming scent at all, but it wasn’t his favorite. He couldn’t think of anything else, so he skipped the second scent. The important thing was calming himself down, not being able to hit each and every requirement given. It was a technique, not a guideline. One thing you can taste. His water bottle wasn’t too far away, tucked between the bed frame and the mattress. He grabbed it and took a few gulps.

Everything reminded him of where he was. Kenma was sitting in the apartment he shared with Akaashi. He was safe, with nothing to worry about. He would be okay. His breathing evened out and his thoughts slowed down. He suddenly felt exhausted, and succumbed to a nap. It was okay if he skipped his classes, he figured. The entire point of switching to online classes was for the flexibility it provided.

When he woke, it was dark. He turned on the light at his desk and found that his roommate had left him a plate of food with a lid on top. He must’ve missed dinner. However, surveying the room, he found said roommate absent. He wandered into the kitchen and heard the sounds of water running from the bathroom, so he figured that Akaashi was taking a shower. He ate his cold dinner in silence, not interested enough to heat it up.

Then he decided he deserved some self care, so he pulled out the carton of vanilla ice cream they kept in the freezer, spooning it into a mug instead of a bowl for no reason other than he could. For the final touch, he added a mound of whipped cream on top. Unfortunately, neither of them had ever felt the need to buy sprinkles, otherwise he would have put some on top as well, for the indulgence. Kenma found it hard to say no to sweets, so it was probably better that he wasn’t very good at baking.

Akaashi--no, Keiji--walked into the kitchen around midnight, towel in hand as he dried his wet hair. He raised an eyebrow at the amount of whipped cream Kenma had on his ice cream, but wordlessly got his own bowl. He probably put twice as much whipped cream than Kenma had though, showing his own affinity for the subsistence. They enjoyed their sweet treats in silence, Keiji trading his towel for his draft of his novel and a red pen, frowning at the pages for the first round of real edits. Neither of them spoke a word, and Kenma was just fine with that.

•••

He let his phone die, relieved at the excuse to not have to talk to people. He posted a hiatus notice on his channel, short and brief. _Apologies for the lag in content, but I’ll be taking some time off_. Keiji did grocery runs about twice a month when they needed it, and Kenma cooked, using internet recipes he thought would taste good. Their 15 kilo rice bag lasted them a good while, with only two people to feed. Keiji was an easy person to cook for, and Kenma made a variety of dishes. Tonkatsu with curry over rice. Onigiri, that was the easiest to make. Udon, sometimes bento boxes when he was feeling particularly lazy.

On the days Kenma didn’t feel like cooking, they ordered takeout, delivered, of course. Akaashi drowned in his work most days, and Kenma didn’t want to leave the apartment. It wasn’t hard to keep the apartment clean, both of them were generally tidy people. He loaned Keiji his charger and never asked for it back, another excuse to not pick up his phone.

They celebrated when Keiji’s book got picked up by a publisher, and Kenma made his favorite: nanohana with karashi dressing. Of course, that meant Keiji got progressively more and more stressed as time went on, so Kenma tried to take on more duties around the apartment. It was summer, and his videos were still gaining views despite there not being any new content for weeks. He went back to making videos of playthroughs once he picked up some new games, talking less than before, but his viewers didn’t seem to mind, just happy for more videos.

Keiji was stressed more often than not nowadays, even though classes were out for a bit, so Kenma decided to take on the twice a month grocery store visits. He found a program at their local grocery store that picked your items out for you, all you had to do was show up and pay for it, so he’d request everything online beforehand, then pick them up and pay. Sometimes he’d find Keiji slumped over his manuscript on the kitchen table, having passed out around 2 or 3 or 4 AM due to editing while exhausted. When that happened, Kenma would just go grab his blanket off his bed and drape it around his tired roommate’s shoulders, replace the stack of papers with a proper pillow, and search for the pen that had inevitably dropped from Keiji’s fingers.

He’d been told once by Keiji that his input was pretty helpful, so when he could, he’d leave little notes on Keiji’s revisions, in a different color so he could differentiate which notes where his and which notes were Kenma’s. Between that and taking on more duties, it was the least he could do for the best roommate he’d ever had. He wasn’t really sure how to approach the situation, and to make sure his roommate took care of himself, but he figured doing the more menial tasks would help lighten his workload. Besides, it wasn’t like Kenma was doing too many things of importance.

Whenever he spotted his phone, sitting in a compartment in his desk, dead and useless, he felt guilty, but not enough to charge it. He wondered if anyone noticed that he was gone, it’d been months since he last used it. He closed the compartment. Most days, he forgot he even had a phone. He found it strangely easy to run from responsibility and all the problems he liked to pretend that didn’t exist. Kenma didn’t ask for his charger back, hoping his phone didn’t get bombarded with messages. Not like anyone really texted him on a constant basis, though.

He finished coding his game and sent it off to a couple producers, who were more than happy to offer him an internship that led into a job at the same company. He hadn’t expected it to be that easy, considering he still hadn’t finished his degree(And the likelihood of him actually finishing was low), but he took it nonetheless. They let him telework whatever weird hours he wanted, telling him he wasn’t the first to work those hours, and set loose deadlines for his next game. Gamer and weird hours were a common thing, he supposed. One of their official artists sent him a few concept design emails, so for a while, he worked on beta testing the game and debugging the code. Keiji bought him a rubber duck, partly as a joke, partly to actually help him debug. The duck had a tendency to fly a lot more than it should have, particularly when Kenma was frustrated with bits and pieces of code that just weren’t adding up. Still, it looked no worse for wear after its endless trips around the room, a resilient duck.

At least his roommate was looking less stressed nowadays, he’d sent in the finished manuscript and when back to working on whatever schoolwork came his way. Kenma signed up for the rest of the game design courses he could, dropping the rest of the classes that he didn’t need.

They talked about getting an actual apartment together, with both of their careers taking off. It was easy to room with each other, besides the fact it saved money. It was easier to room with someone you knew you were compatible with before trying someone new. And Kenma couldn’t have asked for a better roommate, grateful for the fact that Keiji thought he was a good roommate too.

The first time Keiji passed out in the hall, it was the beginning of their junior year, when a lot more pressure fell on his shoulders. Kenma sighed. Apparently he hadn’t been keeping as good an eye on his roommate as he thought he was. He reached for his phone before he was reminded of the fact his phone was currently dead, sitting inside his desk. He used Keiji’s phone instead, dialing an ambulance. He wasn’t pleased when he was discharged, but Kenma would take however upset he got at him, for Keiji’s sake rather than his own. He was determined to help his roommate any way he could.

Kenma got to the point where he could more freely roam the apartment complex, where it was safe, unlike the great outdoors. The panic attacks came less, but he still didn’t want to venture outside and be caught unawares. Plus, all the people he’d have to socialize with put him off the idea. He’d go outside at normal hours when he was ready. In the meantime, he’d stick to Walks At Weird Hours or the shared gym on the second floor. He and Keiji went together when they had time, but Kenma mostly went alone, about once a week. He took a liking to the elliptical. He probably owed it to Akaashi Keiji, without him, he would have been a much less competent human.

Akaashi confessed that he'd actually put in a request for them to room together, and seeing that his mother was friends with one of the deans of students, it wasn't hard for his request to get passed. Kenma didn't mind in the slightest, things had turned out better for the both of them in the end.

**Author's Note:**

> Akaashi and Kenma strike me as people who if given the chance could become really good friends and yeah  
> Also it's the beginning of crackhead hours *thumbs up*
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


End file.
